Chuck vs the Avatar
by VSC
Summary: This story takes place in both the CHUCK and Mass Effect universes, and starts off in the CHUCK 'verse first, shortly after the end of Fake Name. Chuck plays a new game; a gift from his bearded pal. Then it gets a little strange... At its core, this is about ChuckXSarah rediscovering what they mean to each other. There is some coarse language and virtual violence, but that is all.
1. Ch 1 - The Name Game

**AN -** First of all, this isn't and won't be an M-rated story. The themes are teen-friendly. But, since what I've already posted here is about as explicit as it can get, this will also stay M, along with being caught in crossover limbo.

This is a Chuck/Mass Effect crossover - specifically Mass Effect 2. So, it's obviously an AU story with its own character insights and perspectives, but it starts at a place all Chuck fans know well in canon - Fake Name... yikes.

I've been wanting to mashup these two fanchises for quite some time now. The beginnings of this story have been around since the fall of '16. I thought I would try to post it for N7 day at that time, but RL invaded, blah blah blah, trying to make this remotely work happened, gnashing of teeth, blah blah blah...

Anyway, Happy _Extremely_ Belated N7 Day. And it's always Chuck day for me, any day.

I know there are lot of fans of both stories, and I tried to create something here that fans from both franchises could enjoy. But, you're obviously going to be a lot better off if you know something about both of them. Honestly, after the next chapter, I have no idea where it's going to go, either - if anywhere.

If anything, maybe this will encourage me to open up that game I saved over a year ago to ponder it, and maybe make you scratch your head and say... okay, let's do this!

Let me know where or what you think.

And, just in case anyone is wondering, I don't own Chuck or Mass Effect or Tron, etc.

The only thing I get from this is enjoyment. I hope you do, too.

* * *

 **Chapter 1 - The Name Game**

"I'm Sam. My real name is Sam."

-oOo-

"Charles, say it isn't so," Stephen Bartowski said mournfully, watching his son over a webcam.

Secrets (as simple as a first name), deceit, manipulation, and violence, and yes, spying; he never wanted this life for Chuck. He knew all of what the life of a spy was about and tried to protect his son from it.

Manipulation...

Not a day had passed that he didn't regret having Bryce plant those test answer keys under Charles' bed; manipulating his own son to keep him out of this life. It broke his heart to see what they'd done, to keep him safe; manipulation and deceit that dashed his son's hopes for a Stanford degree, and for five years left him nearly broken and adrift. But he _was_ safe... until Bryce Larkin sent his son the very thing he was trying to protect Charles from becoming.

When Stephen pondered how—after all he had done to keep Chuck from being used by the CIA—that Bryce had still sent the Intersect to his son... well, he wondered why he didn't 'clock' him the moment he saw him. The bastard had placed his son's life in far more jeopardy by sending the Intersect to an untrained agent. Only one thing prevented him from flattening the nose on Bryce's smug face: the fact that they were at his daughter's wedding reception.

Then came Sarah Walker, along with more secrets and deceit, and the violence and danger brought by the enemies they faced because of those secrets they coveted and kept. Chuck wasn't working with them by choice. But he'd also discovered that, with Chuck's help, she and John Casey had done a lot of good.

They'd also admirably kept Charles safe... and vice versa. They'd developed a bond.

The last night he saw his son, at Eleanor's wedding, Charles had so fervently said he loved her. He could certainly understand it. Agent Walker was an amazing woman. She was the one who had found Orion. And the only reason she did it was for Chuck and Ellie. He saw it the instant he finally met her in person, in his Airstream trailer in the middle of nowhere.

Stephen couldn't fault his son for his choice to pick Sarah, because he'd done the same thing himself. His son was in love with a spy... still was. A spy still keeping her own secrets from him after all this time. That couldn't be more painfully obvious now.

And she'd once cared about him; that was plain to see in his trailer, and everywhere he saw them thereafter. Something told Stephen, "Sam" still did.

Stephen Bartowski understood fully well what it was like to fall in love with a spy. However, unlike Sam ( _Samantha?_ ), Mary had little compunction about bending protocol when he'd pursued her. He even knew her real name right away. Admittedly, their circumstances were different. He didn't have all the government's secrets in his head, and the CIA considered him an independent contractor, not an asset. But she'd never kept him emotionally at bay once they both realized how they felt. Inscrutable as she often was, there was a pragmatism about Mary that was forthright, sometimes painfully direct, when it came to their relationship and voicing the choices they made.

In fact, there was never any fear of that kind between the two of them in spite of the pressures they were under. As hard as it was to believe—because she was the personification of Frost when she was on her game—Mary never held back, pursued him just as much; protocol be damned. She didn't give a damn what the powers-that-be thought.

She didn't care what they thought _now_ , either, not a bit. But that was another story.

To be fair, those clearly weren't the circumstances for Sarah and his son. Fraternization rules were much stricter due to their asset/handler relationship. After watching the two of them from afar for a while (via John Casey's security network feeds), he'd come to the conclusion that the only thing holding _those_ two back was fear. Fear of a lot of things no doubt (both Chuck and Sarah had a lot of baggage), but what might happen if Sarah's superiors found out and separated them, was most likely the largest reason.

Stephen could certainly understand _that,_ knowing firsthand what his government was capable of doing. That he was responsible for some his son's baggage, was the rancid icing on the cake.

Despite their best efforts to prevent it, the world of espionage and spies had still wreaked havoc on the life they shared with their children. _His_ work was what tore them apart. And as much as Stephen hated it, Mary was the logical one to try to save Hartley from what that work had turned their best friend into... Alexei Volkoff. Then the same government that so highly valued that work, burned his wife and made him a wanted man... after they tried to sequester him first in a bunker.

Stephen couldn't, _wouldn_ _'t_ let that happen to his son or daughter. But despite his every effort, it still happened to Chuck... until he freed his son from that infernal program that had robbed him of his freedom and turned him into a throwaway tool. Or so he thought.

He could tell at the time that Sarah wanted Chuck to be free of it too. And his greatest fear, when all was said and done, was that his son and Sarah would still somehow fall into the same trap as Mary and him.

But now his son and Agent Walker were... what? They certainly weren't together. It didn't make sense. Had his son become something to be used again? Was that why Sarah was so angry? Or was there more to it?

For six months, Charles had fallen off the grid. Then he'd picked up bits and pieces of chatter that he was back in Burbank; back at the Buy More. Why?

 _Because he_ _'s the goddamned Intersect again; you know it. Damn it!_ Stephen didn't want to believe it was true. But everything he'd seen seemed to be pointing to that. So he started watching again, the one way he knew best.

Bryce was dead, and the Intersect cube that he'd given him was destroyed. His son was apparently trying to become a real spy (not that he wasn't a great one already). And the woman Chuck loved (and whom appeared to love him, too), seemed to have dropped him like any disciplined person drops a bad habit. The open-handed knock-out blow she'd given him on a nightclub dance floor was cringe-worthy. And it'd happened during a mission where she had essentially been the solitary magnet for a male mark; one far too solo and demeaning (in his opinion).

Sarah Walker, at least as far as Charles was concerned, had been 'present' ever since.

What happened?

Though he did _not_ trust the CIA, Stephen simply couldn't believe that Sarah was playing his son the whole time. She still went to amazing lengths to protect him. Why would she leave him, especially if they were still working together? And why had she rebounded right into the arms of another spy?

Maybe Agent Walker wasn't as disciplined as Stephen thought.

There was also _something_ wrong about Daniel Shaw. The man he saw rubbing Sarah's shoulders on a hacked security/surveillance camera feed, had a coldly calculating look in his eyes while he did it. Their new 'team leader's' intentions seemed muddy at best, divisive... and manipulative. _Damn._

Tipping his head down, Stephen J. Bartowski covered his eyes thoughtfully and sadly with his hand. Though everyone thought he was scatterbrained, and admittedly sometimes the thing in his head made him feel that way himself; he knew how to use that facade to keep everyone off balance. Not even perceptive Sarah Walker had seen the real him. None of them saw how far he was 'in it'. He saw everything... with more than his eyes. And right now, he was wondering if Sarah saw his real son, too. She sure as hell didn't seem to see the real Daniel Shaw. She'd told him her real name, for fuck's sake. How had that gift of perception and all that training let her down?

What had caused Sarah Walker to suddenly become this angry, distant, and blind?

He knew the answer now, even as he asked himself the question. Love... and possibly rage... and maybe guilt. He'd finally found that video from a security camera in Prague, though it told far from the complete story of what occurred between them or during that six months Chuck was gone.

The son he saw on the hacked webcam now, looked almost as bad as he did after being kicked out of Stanford... with the possible exception of 'the cheeseball incident' when he'd first resurfaced. Whatever had happened to him and Sarah (again?) had also caused Chuck to rebound just as hard. A nerd did seem like a good fit for his son... _but_... That 'but' (or more than one) caused his son to break it off. That was pretty cringe-worthy too.

 _Because he_ _'s really become a spy, and they've drilled it into his head that he can't share that truth... if any. He thinks he's living a lie._

 _How can something with such noble intentions be so fucked up?_

Everything he was seeing seemed to be begging the question: did Sarah not want this for his son? Was his becoming a spy, that noble gesture to serve something larger; was it a life she really didn't want for him? If so, Orion and Sarah were on the same page, and he loved her for it. But, if that was so, why had she kept encouraging his son to 'be that guy'? Because, Stephen had to admit, his son had proven to be 'that guy'.

So, why the hell was Sarah with Daniel Shaw in light of all of this? Even now, Chuck made Blackbriar look like a zombie-like CIA clone by comparison.

Stephen shook his head sadly as he looked at his son's image on the screen... the result of 'all of this.' Chuck was binging again. For the past five days he hadn't had more than a few hours of sleep. Case in point: it was currently well past midnight, and he'd gone to bed at four that morning before his Buy More shift.

No, it wasn't booze or drugs; his son had never sunk that far. For Charles, binging was the escape of video games, Red Bull, cheese balls, and the occasional two-liter bottle of Mountain Dew... and yes, admittedly, sometimes what Chuck called his 'thinking juice'. He'd also picked up a taste for Hot Pockets somewhere. _At least he isn't drinking scotch with them._

For a week now, Charles had been locked away in his bedroom every moment he had free, avoiding everyone who meant anything to him. He'd started with a game that Stephen knew well: Duck Hunt. Mario Kart followed hot on its heels. But then, he'd watched as his son escaped into the world of Halo and Call of Duty (which under the circumstances was fitting).

It was kind of odd watching a man who so clearly had a fear and revulsion of firearms using them so freely, accurately, and aggressively in a game. Chuck was also a damn good gamer. Watching Chuck play Splinter Cell was an eye-opener. Far Cry was surreal on multiple levels. Team Fortress was violent comedy in action, and Stephen was astounded by the way his son played every specialty with equal skill and aplomb.

And, he also had to admit, his son had built an amazing gaming rig. It made the computer that fried when Bryce sent him the Intersect look like a Commodore 64 by comparison. It would make what he was pondering easy.

Perspective.

If his son was seeking solace and perspective in a video game, Stephen had the ability to give him the Ace of Spades. Maybe he could do even more than that.

What he was thinking of doing would also answer the burning question: had his son been Intersected again?

The game Chuck was now playing was perfect for it. It was also now residing on Stephen's incredibly powerful machine in his cabin. He'd sucked it right off his son's PC hard drive.

Stephen had also been sucked into the game himself.

Yup; Stephen Bartowski had game too. A solitary life off the grid left a lot of free time for that kind of indulgence; an indulgence that also kept the loneliness from driving him insane.

Off the grid. Life was full of juxtapositions.

The Tron poster he'd given to Chuck was still on his wall. Life on the grid—the game grid—would soon have new meaning for both of them if Stephen's suspicions were true. Stephen looked up at his own wall-expansive supercomputer.

"Sam," he said in greeting. The irony of that name wasn't lost on him, either. S.A.M., Stephen's Artificial Mind MkIII, was his third attempt at programming an AI—an artificial intelligence. He should have called her Sam3 (Sam Cubed) because she was just as big of a deep learning leap. And like he'd quickly learned to respect Agent Walker's abilities and dedication to his son's wellbeing, he was just as damn proud of Sam's abilities.

"Yes, Orion?" the feminine voice replied.

"We have a new project that needs to get done in a hurry. I have a decompiling task for you. It's on drive I: Mass Effect 2."

"The entire executable, DLCs, and related sub-directories?"

"Along with the associated dynamic link libraries and registry keys you downloaded. Cross-application communication and memory management is going to be critical with this project."

"Accessed and started. Will you be having your usual midnight cup of tea?"

Stephen softly chuckled. "When it's safe to be one, I'm a creature of habit."

"It's safe for the moment, Stephen. The task will be done by the time your water is hot."

"That's fast. Are you in a bigger hurry than usual?"

"You said _you_ were. And I sense you have other tasks for me, like information gathering and procuring bandwidth, so I'll be starting those too. Besides, the propane tank is empty. You're going to have to hook up another. Chop-chop." A pair of claps accompanied the last two words.

With a chuckling shake of his head, Stephen Bartowski strode to the door to get another propane tank from the cache. As he opened it, he looked over his shoulder and smiled at the pair of unblinking eyes that looked like that of the HAL 9000, times two. "Sam, find everything you can about the lore of this universe my son is playing in... and for the duration of this project, and possibly for the foreseeable future, I'm giving you a new name... EDI."

His computer actually laughed, and then just as quickly changed it's voice to one more somber. "I think I understand why."

"I'm not the least bit surprised," Stephen replied, his voice just as somber.

"EDI is a nice change of pace... less... annoying, considering recent events. I'm sorry, Orion; sorry for your son and Sarah. I wish I understood emotion better."

"You have nothing to be sorry about. You have a better grasp of emotion than you realize. I only wish a certain young woman understood it better, what her choices may have precipitated. Who she's decided to pursue—in spite of Charles actions to try to set things right—makes me think she hasn't given them much thought."

"Maybe we can help change that. Oh, by the way; since you've decided to call me EDI, I'm going to call you the Illusive Man for those foreseeable clock cycles myself. It fits; at least the illusive part."

"I agree," Stephen chuckled again, thankful that his faithful companion could so easily reinvigorate his mood. "Though, I'd like to think I learned at least a little from my mistakes, and that my intentions are better than his. In case you haven't already, start a sampling task on the voice actor's voices."

"Already started." Formerly Sam's voice changed to that of EDI in the game. "Do you want me to leave the encoded package updates to you?"

Turning to leave again, Stephen's head spun around and he snorted loudly. "You can start them. We'll tweak them together. EDI, you and I are going to be doing some serious game modding."

"As you wish. Sounds meaningful, like fun. Working. Get your tea. When you get back, I should be ready. I also have a few more ideas to share; some variables and possible solutions you may have not considered."

As he nodded and left to retrieve the propane bottle, Stephen marveled at the pace his AI was learning the nuances of human interaction, or more appropriately put, conversational banter. Not to mention her ever growing capacity to intuitively look ahead with her problem solving. Considering how terrible he was at it himself, he was beginning to wonder who was teaching who.

Then his thoughts drifted to this project: this game his son was playing and how the woman he was now pursuing as the game's protagonist was in many ways like the one who had such a grip on his heart in real life.

He also knew that EDI was fully aware how dangerous it could be to do what he just knew she was thinking. He shook his head... _whoa_.

S.A.M., or E.D.I., as he was calling her now, was really him in many ways, and he'd tried to give her some of Mary's traits, as well as their kids, too. Like his children, he truly wanted her to be something more than him.

He was going to catch hell for this, and she knew it, essentially taking his son hostage this way, but the real wild card was...

A thought struck him like one of those weapons he'd seen his son wielding in the game he was currently playing. To make this work he was going to need help.

And as he absently opened the front door to the cabin, juggling two tanks of propane, EDI said to him: "Shall I contact John Casey for you now? Or would you prefer to wait until he's awake? "

-xXx-

Sitting at his computer, Chuck was marveling at the similarities. To think that Morgan had given these games to him for Christmas and he was just now getting around to playing them. Not that the life of a spy in training left much room for games.

At least he didn't have to hear the constant 'have you played it yet?' stuck on repeat anymore. And once Morgan knew he was playing, amazingly, he'd only interrupted the gameplay twice to gush about it. When it came to games, his buddy knew where the priorities were.

Totally absorbed in the game, he blew through Mass Effect in twenty-two hours straight. Well, not quite. There was that one involuntary nap in his computer chair after the first eighteen hours. He'd also played an unknown number of hours building a character and settling on a specialty for him. He'd even done a quick play-through as a female version of Commander Shepard. He'd named her Sarah, and found it surprisingly insightful. So, yeah, it was really more like forty hours... or so, all together.

When Morgan gave him the disks at the Buy More Christmas party, it had come with another IOU for Mass Effect 2, since the second game hadn't been released yet. Given what had happened with the last IOU from his pal, that he'd found in his wallet in Barstow, collecting on it felt a kind of weird. Although, because of that first IOU, and the fact he was finally playing the game, Morgan made good on it in mere minutes.

The game disk was in his drive in mere minutes, too. Chuck had played roleplaying games before, but as sci-fi games went, Mass Effect was unique... and addicting. Action and adventure and romance in one galaxy-spanning bundle. He'd 'romantically' pursued a blue-skinned alien in that first installment, named Liara T'Soni. She was as unique and endearing as the game. Chuck, on the double-rebound, fell for her in a flash.

Virtual game romance with an alien may have been a bit weird, but it was a welcome departure considering where his real life love life had gone. He was an emotional wreck. By going brain-dead on a train platform in Prague, he'd lost Sarah. Not making any effort to explain his motives for not running away, reduced what they'd slowly built over two-and-a-half years to a shaky friendship in a single, bone-headed moment.

Then, after hearing Sarah say her real name to Daniel, Chuck's world—along with what felt like what remained of their friendship—had seemingly fallen apart, and he had no idea how to fix it.

And now, after almost seeing her killed because of his moonlighting, he'd turned away Hannah... horrifically.

To top it all off, he hadn't seen Sarah for days.

Yeah, he knew he was currently running away from his problems, having to see her friendly indifference again. He kept promising himself that he wouldn't let himself go where he had gone with Jill; that he would grit his teeth and push through this, learn to live with it, mend his heart on his own.

In so doing, he'd also become a rather rough version of Commander Shepard in the game universe in which he was now residing: a paragade, as the game community called it; a combination of the words paragon and renegade. It was as if he'd unintentionally taken a little bit of Rafe Gruber along with him when he entered it.

It didn't start off that way. In his quest for escape from the hard reality of the last several weeks, he'd tried hard to recapture his moral center; to be the man (in a virtual sense) that he'd heard Sarah say to Shaw he was losing to becoming a spy.

He just couldn't fathom it. He was becoming a real spy like Shaw, but still doing it his own way. He may have been learning some of the grittier methods, but his core values hadn't changed. However, Sarah had clearly chosen Daniel over him. She'd given Shaw her real name in the span of months, when she'd resisted telling him for over two-and-a-half years. It made no sense. He still supported Sarah unconditionally, but right now, direct and gruff Miranda Lawson made infinitely more sense... and she was 110% present at the moment... sort of.

But Sarah's words still stirred him. They always did.

He was totally shocked when he started playing Mass Effect 2.

Morgan had tried to warn him, saying something about "Chuck, there's this woman... you won't believe it, who she—"

That was when he cut his bearded pal off, with a "don't spoil me" end of conversation statement. He should have heard his friend out.

He almost quit when he saw her. In fact, he did quit, stunned when he saw the face of the woman over him when his game character awoke in her lab.

It didn't take long for his curiosity to get the better of him, though. The resemblance, the voice, the mannerisms were uncanny. And Miranda was by no means a pushover either, but her forthrightness was refreshing. She didn't mince words the way someone else he knew and cared about was currently doing.

And yet, she was still so much like Sarah: tough, driven, passionate, and even caring in her own way. He was just getting to 'know' her, and, like his real life, he found himself taking every opportunity to accompany Miranda on missions. Or rather, in this case, make sure he always assigned her to be with him. In Mass Effect 2 he never stayed in the car... he couldn't. He had to be a leader. And for quite a while he butted heads with Miranda. Charles (or Chuck) Shepard loved every minute of it.

Miranda made him tougher because, like Sarah, she was tough. If he was going to lead, he had to match her will and strength.

Hence, he'd become a bit of a renegade in doing so. Although, the game scoring system didn't necessarily reward a Commander Shepard who was in the middle. Strength was attained by either taking the virtuous path or one more morally questionable. A Commander Shepard in the middle of the road could find himself getting run over by a six-wheeled Mako armored vehicle—or _herself_ , since Commander Shepard could also be played as a woman.

Still, in the game, like real life, Chuck gravitated toward a moral and more selfless path. However, Miranda, and a couple of teammates like his best bud, Garrus, sometimes still brought out the bad-boy in him. Renegade choices were always tempting. There was also the fact that Commander Shepard always packed a lot of heat... and used it.

Well, not always. He'd started off playing the game as an engineer, because, at the heart of it, that was what Chuck Bartowski still was. But he'd started a new game after playing that way for several hours... more than once. Switching first to a Sentinel, that had a skillset and biotics (a form of telekinetic augmentation) that reminded him a lot his current Intersected situation, he'd settled into the character of a stealthy infiltrator on his third go. He simply found it more fun being a sneaky spy-commando... a spy like Sarah. Ironically, the character specialty was also paid homage to Casey because the infiltrator's primary weapon was a sniper rifle.

Chuck got into Mass Effect 2 so much, he'd called Morgan and requested a few days off. He also wasn't flashing. It was getting so bad Casey had taken to calling him 'the Lemon' again. Fortunately, there had also been a lull in the missions after taking down Rafe. Unfortunately, that also meant that Sarah was spending a lot of time with Daniel, exacerbating the whole situation for him. Chuck's heart was busted wide open.

Though, somehow, he'd managed to keep from showing it. He wasn't going to deny Sarah the opportunity to have something real, even if it wasn't with him. In that respect, Chuck felt like a failure. Gaming, and building a virtual relationship, first with Liara T'Soni, and then immediately finding he wanted to start one with Miranda Lawson, was one of the few things keeping it from eating him up. That is, until he realized he was unwittingly being sucked into a romantic triangle. Liara was nowhere to be seen by a resurrected Commander Shephard in Mass Effect 2, except at the very beginning... before he'd died.

Until he received a message from Liara and traveled to Illium to help her. He'd taken Miranda on those missions, and it had been awkward because he'd fallen for Miranda the first time he saw her and heard her voice—as awkward as the circumstances he'd painfully shared with Hannah and Sarah.

The realization that he'd 'fallen' for Miranda Lawson struck very close to home. Because he was still 'in love' with Liara. To his surprise, the emotions the interactions in the game engendered were stunningly strong. They were also a welcome distraction. Still, Miranda reminded Chuck of Sarah so much. And Miranda was beginning to show the potential for the kind of relationship that Sarah now refused to even ponder. Ironically, Miranda also brought out the soft side of him, but one that was less fearful to act on his feelings... feelings he really felt for Sarah.

God, it was as confusing as it was an escape; conversing with Miranda, and all the while thinking of Sarah while he did. There was one difference. Miranda didn't hold it against him when the mission demanded he be just as tough as her. Miranda let paragon (or in his case slightly paragade) Commander Shepard do what had to be done, make the hard call, without judgment... or guilt.

But it was just a game, right?

It was until the cut-scene that took place when he and his squad returned from their mission on Horizon; a mission from which they'd barely escaped, let alone been victorious.

As the 'loading' symbol on the lower left corner of the screen appeared and turned, the screen went blank, and familiar green text, scrolling across the screen word-by-word, replaced it as the webcam activity light lit. A computer-altered voice accompanied it.

 **HELLO CHUCK.**

Chuck blinked hard and shook his head. "Dad?"

 **HOW ARE YOU HOLDING UP, SON?**

"I've had better days," Chuck said, mirthlessly chuckling.

 **PLAYING GAMES AGAIN TO COPE, I SEE.**

"You never miss a thing, do you?" Chuck pursed his lips as the words passed them. _Just how much do you know, Dad?_

 **NOPE. NOT A THING.**

The hair on the back of Chuck's neck suddenly stood up.

 **THAT** **'S A FUN GAME.**

"You've played it?" Chuck said incredulously.

 **THE FIRST ONE. THE ONE YOU** **'RE PLAYING NOW, TOO.**

 **IN A MANNER OF SPEAKING.**

"Huh? What the heck does that mean?"

 **DO YOU REMEMBER THE NIGHT I TOOK YOU TO SEE TRON?**

Chuck glanced up at the poster on the wall over his computer and cocked his head curiously to the side. "Yeah. It made quite an impression on me... made me want to be an engineer like you and Flynn."

 **FLYNN WAS AN AMAZING CHARACTER; ALWAYS PUSHING IT.**

 **HE PUSHED THE MCP RIGHT INTO A VIRTUAL CORNER.**

"Yeah, he did. And the MCP zapped him and sucked him into a virtual world. It was a heck-of-an-adventure."

 **YES, IT WAS.**

 **KIND OF LIKE THE ONE YOU** **'RE PLAYING IN NOW.**

For a second the screen went blank before the next line of text appeared.

 **WHY DID YOU DO IT, SON?**

Chuck gulped and stared at the web camera. "Do what? What are you talking about?"

 **YOU KNOW. DO I HAVE TO SHOW YOU?**

"Dad, if you mean why I'm still working with Sarah and Casey, I'm just an analyst now," Chuck stammered, "I still have something to offer—"

 **YES, YOU DO.**

 **BUT YOU DIDN** **'T HAVE TO DO THAT TO PROVE IT.**

"Do _that?_ Dad... what are you talking about? I haven't done—"

 **WHAT AM I TALKING ABOUT?**

 **THIS.**

Chuck's eyes shot involuntarily wide as a symbol flashed onto the screen. It was one very similar to the symbol that had once appeared on his computer, on a night he couldn't have felt more alone. It was the night his dad showed him that the NSA had no intention of helping him get this thing out of his head; this thing he was now trying to keep his dad from knowing about. That night, he thought his last safe-haven in this world, Sarah, had abandoned him, by accepting the orders of General Beckman; orders that would have kept him under the government's thumb. And that night, Orion helped him escape.

Like the symbol that appeared on his computer screen that night had done, this one precipitated a flash. But this one wasn't filled with nearly as much information. In fact, it felt more like it had opened a gateway... a portal? It sure looked and felt like one. _You_ _'ve gotta be frakkin kidding me._ He couldn't move a muscle.

 **I THOUGHT SO. THAT GODDAMNED 2.0**

 **I** **'M SORRY, CHARLES.**

 **WHAT I** **'M GOING TO DO NOW, AMOUNTS TO KIDNAPPING.**

 **I KNOW, THERE'S A PUN THERE.**

 **BUT, RIGHT OR WRONG, I DO THINK IT** **'S WORTH IT. SO, I'M GOING TO CALL IT AN INTERVENTION.**

 **BRACE YOURSELF. IT** **'S TIME TO BE COMMANDER SHEPARD.**

 **SORRY, BUT NOT.**

 **END OF LINE... (I** **'VE ALWAYS WANTED TO SAY THAT)**

 _Wha-..._ _oh... shit_...

Like every time he'd experienced this, thousands of images flashed in front of Chuck's eyes. However, after an untold number, that was where the similarity ended. Still images became animated as they flashed before him. But in his mind, time seemed to freeze as solid as a block of ice as it happened. The images then began to swirl around him like a vortex, and they sucked him in... just like Kevin Flynn.

Suddenly, Chuck didn't just have game; he was in it.

* * *

Yup, it's time to suspend your disbelief again.


	2. Ch 2 - An Unexpected Push

**AN** \- I always found it hard to believe that Stephen Bartowski would simply sit on the sidelines after what happened at the end of season two. Okay, so maybe making him a Charah shipper here is a bit much. *snicker*

Now it's Casey's turn. I've also thought it would be fun to have the guy with the new gap in his teeth pull a one-eighty on Sarah at this point in the show...

I don't own any of it.

* * *

 **Chapter 2 - An Unexpected Push**

Dressed in her Double O uniform, Sarah strode down the stairs into Castle with a pair of cups of coffee, expecting to see Daniel. However, the only one in the large main room was John Casey. Per the usual, he was cleaning several field-stripped guns spread out on the conference table.

"Casey," she said, acknowledging his perfunctory grunt of greeting. "Where's Daniel?"

Casey grunted again, but this time the disgust within it was unmistakable. "So you and Superman are on a first name basis now, huh? And now you're bringing _him_ coffee?" He grunted again. "Shaw's in the back, sleeping. I think living down here is screwing with his sleep rhythms... along with the way you've been dipping your chocolate in his peanut butter."

"Screw you, Casey," Sarah breathed, her icy glare intense as she froze in her tracks.

"Screw me? Not a chance, _Sam_. The lemon's already got enough problems trying to accept the idea of you with _Daniel_."

Sarah's mouth fell open and then just as quickly drew into a grim line. "I assure you, Chuck has accepted the idea of me and... Shaw. He told me so himself. He has Hannah now. He doesn't have any interest in me like that anymore."

"Oh really?" The sidelong glance Casey returned as he jabbed the cleaning rod into the bore of a pistol was loaded with cynically mock surprise. "What planet have you been living on, Walker? The lemon broke up with Hannah days ago. Funny how you didn't even notice." He smirked when it took Sarah a long moment to regain her composure enough to reply.

"Chuck broke up with her?"

"Yeah. I think it finally sunk in, how problematic it was for the Intersect to be dating a civilian after it almost got her killed... among other things, like the lies and fake names. The nerdette is gone. Tell me; other than the lemon suddenly not being able to flash again, have you at all considered why Bartowski hasn't been around here for the last several days?"

"I would assume it's because he's emotional again," Sarah defensively replied, the word 'emotional' carrying a derisive tinge.

"Yer damn right he is," Casey said with another grunt. "Why make it worse by coming down here to see you all lovey-dovey with another coworker?"

Now Sarah was speechless as she stared at her longtime partner, her hands threatening to collapse the warm cups in them.

"Have you given any thought as to why Chuck has had so much trouble with the Intersect since, oh, about a month after he began his training? Why he flunked?" Casey continued, grinding the words out between gritted teeth.

"Not because of me, if that's what you're getting at. He made his choice, and now he has to live with it... besides... Chuck's changing."

"Yeah, he is. He's trying to live up to the choice he made to serve the greater good. But it's damn obvious he hasn't changed as much as you seem to think. You saw it... _him,_ the moment he defused that bomb with a porn virus. So did I. That scared guy is still there, still doin' it. He's also an important part of that greater good; a good man. But, get it through your thick skull, that the greater good wasn't the only reason he made that choice, Walker. Because it's also obvious the poor sap still loves you, and the status quo is fucking us up as a team."

"Then I suppose it's up to me to set the drama queen straight about his emotions... _again_ ," Sarah snapped back, the irony of her own slipping emotions showing starkly.

Casey's reply was a low, deep whisper. "Yeah, why don't you do that, Walker. Tell it to him just as level-headed as that. Tell him to set aside his lady feelings again so you can further justify your guilt. Finish driving the wedge in this team that the two-by-four stuck between all of us."

"Are you done?" Sarah fumed.

"No. But if I say much more about you and the lemon's misdirected emotions, I'm gonna puke. So I'll just leave you with _this_ newsflash of insight, since you seem be having as much trouble doing it as the nerd. _You_ _'_ _re_ a big part of the reason Chuck's done all the heroic shit he's done... and damn near every emotion he's showed while doing it... or not. Yeah, he screwed up in Prague... at the train station and beyond. He knows he screwed up. Accept it... get over it... forgive him... help him with it."

Sarah's mouth fell open again. As she slammed the two cups of coffee down on the conference table, she came real close to flipping Casey the bird before she stormed back up the stairs in anger. Truth be told, she was as mortified as she was angry. _Casey knew?_

"Don't think for a second it's going to be quick and painless," Casey growled as the door closed behind her. And though it was automated, he could swear he heard it slam. "Wake up and do something sensible with _your_ lady feelings for once, Sarah," he muttered to himself after the door closed. He shook his head slowly in disgust. "I hope that was enough to do it, Steve."

Then, Colonel Casey grunted again, this time in disbelief. How the hell did he let Stephen Bartowski talk him into something like this? He'd asked for twenty-four hours. Twenty-four hours? The idea of the elder Bartowski fixing an emotional mess like this, in that span of time, well, it made him cynically chuckle.

Yeah, he really was worried about the team, but morbid curiosity seemed to be what was motivating John Casey the most at the moment. He'd just rattled the cage that his favorite partner was residing in pretty damn hard.

"Good luck, Orion. You're gonna need it."

-xXx-

Sarah was still livid. And her neighboring drivers were paying the price for her anger as she swerved her Porsche in and out of traffic on the freeway.

How did she let Casey get under her skin like that?

Her partner had long had a way of tweaking her like this... cold, dry, and acerbic. Though, Sarah had to admit, when he yanked her chain this hard, there was often a valid reason for John Casey doing it.

She also had to admit, what Casey had said about Daniel was a concern of hers from the very beginning.

Was that why she was so mad? Had she lost her perspective, and along with it her edge? There were times when she felt like a zombie these days, like she was simply going through the motions. Casey was right. She did feel like she was the cause, of the direction that a man she cared deeply for had chosen to take. But her stoic partner was also right when he said it was Chuck's choice to make. And he was damn good at it. Better than good. He was great.

She'd once told him, he could do anything he chose to do. And he was proving it. Anything he wanted he could have. She'd said that too. He wanted her. Casey saw that too. _Casey..._ reminding her that, for all the guilt she carried with her, deep down, she'd wanted Chuck to choose her.

Despite everything that had happened, she still did.

And yet, she'd shared the one thing Chuck wanted to know for years with another man... in the span of months.

Sarah wasn't just angry with her partner's stinging insight, she was angry with herself. Thinking long and hard about it as she drove, she had a lot of reasons to feel that way. Though Chuck had made his choice in a way that was completely out of character for him—when he left her more crushed than she ever thought possible—on that train platform in the Nadrazi station; he'd still made the right choice. He'd made the best choice for the two of them and his family; the family that he'd often said was her family, too.

And the result of that choice, and because of the out-of-character way he'd told her about it; it had left him so bereft, he couldn't make the Intersect function. Why didn't she see that? Why didn't she see the source of his emotions, and how those emotions for her showed how much he was still her Chuck... how they made him great.

Sarah had to see him; to somehow try to make this right... for the both of them.

Taking the next off-ramp on the 405, she turned around and sped back down the freeway, back to Echo Park.

-oOo-

When she finally got up the nerve to knock on his door, no one answered. But a quick glance at her phone showed he was there. Yes, through it all, Sarah Walker was still tracking Chuck Bartowski's every move. She could say it was because she was still his handler, but Sarah knew better. At times she felt like a stalker for doing it, but, the truth was, she simply cared.

No, there was nothing simple about it. It was a continuing convoluted mess, but she still cared as much about Chuck as he did about her.

 _So, why isn't he answering?_ As screwed up as things were between them, and as devastated as he must be by what she'd revealed to Daniel, Chuck wouldn't snub her for making this gesture. Chuck would never be that cold.

Sarah strode to the Morgan door and peeked into his room. Chuck was there. The screen of his computer was lighting his face. Something, however, wasn't right. He wasn't moving. In fact, the way he was staring at his computer monitor, he looked like he was in a trance.

And before she knew it, she was in his bedroom, rushing to his side.

"Chuck?" He didn't move, didn't react in the slightest. The cacophony of sound coming from the speakers was certainly loud enough for him not to hear her, so she then shook his shoulder and tried again. " _Chuck?_ Come on, talk to me... don't be that way..."

Nothing.

Another shake of his shoulder, and again no response. "Chuck? Are... are you okay?" Perplexity turned to alarm as she looked at the computer screen his eyes were fixed upon. A game was playing on it: an action game? But Chuck wasn't controlling it. His hands, resting on the keyboard and mouse, were unmoving. How was that possible?

Panic overtook Sarah Walker the spy; something that rarely happened to her, except when it came to Chuck. Had the Intersect malfunctioned? Her phone was out and in her hand, in a proverbial flash.

Chuck needed help.

To her surprise, she scrolled right past their team leader's name, and she was about to call Casey when the screen of her phone went blank. Green text then started to scroll across it.

 **IF YOU WANT TO HELP HIM, WAIT.**

 _What? What the hell?!_ In an instant, clarity came like cold water thrown in her face. _Orion?!_ It had to be him. Somehow, Chuck's father had something to do with this. "How...? Wait? For what? How can I help?" she asked, her shrill whisper dumbfounded. Then her eyes grew huge as the reply to her unconsciously voiced thoughts appeared.

 **CHARLES IS OK. JUST WAIT, AND YOU** **'** **LL SOON HAVE YOUR ANSWER.**

So, for an interminable amount of time, dumbstruck Sarah waited, and watched. It was hard not to. On Chuck's computer a battle was being played out. Three people were engaged in a firefight with a large force of what looked like robots and men in armored suits wielding futuristic weapons. Well, one of the three people didn't even look human... far from it. In fact, some of the their opponents looked as alien as him. Also clad in armored suits, the three of them were wiping the battle-space clean. And one of the trio looked a lot like Chuck. And the third one looked a lot like her!

She stared at the woman. With hair of black, her face was a dead ringer for her own, right down to her piercing blue eyes. The woman was also engaging the enemy forces with more than the powerful gun in her hand, doing incredible damage with energy bolts that flew from her hand. So was the man who looked like Chuck. Though, using what looked like a sniper's rifle, he was also using _it_ with deadly accuracy. And every time he moved from cover to cover, he disappeared! Only to reappear and take another startlingly quick and effective shot.

One of those shots felled an enemy soldier that had the drop on... on her? At least someone who looked uncannily like her. It was like she was watching universes colliding.

A knock on Chuck and Morgan's front door then jerked her from the surreal and futuristic world she was witnessing. Her phone buzzed in her hand.

 **ANSWER IT.**

Sarah shook her head, and in a daze, strode woodenly to the door. When she opened it, a delivery man was there: a WorldSend man; the chosen carriers of the agencies her team worked for.

"I have a delivery for Sarah Walker," he said.

"That's me," she replied absently.

"Credentials, please," he said. "This delivery is marked classified."

Sarah blinked, and just as absently pulled her ID wallet from her jacket pocket and showed it to him. Whereupon, he handed her an electronic bill-of-lading device and said, "Sign here."

 _What the hell? How the fuck did he do that?_

And just like that, the deliveryman was gone with a "Thank you. Have a good night, Agent Walker."

Sarah stared at the box he placed in her hand as she walked back to Chuck's room. Then, sitting heavily on his bed, she pulled a knife from her pocket, flicked it open, and slit open the package. In it was what looked like a pair of goggles and a handwritten note, apparently in Stephen Bartowski's surprisingly neat script.

 **In the computer gaming world these are what are called VR glasses. VR stands for virtual reality. Make sure you are sitting down somewhere comfortable when you put them on.**

 **You once asked Chuck to trust you. At a time when he probably shouldn** **'** **t. He did. He does. Now I'm asking you to trust me.**

 **Trust me, Sarah.**

 **Stephen**

 _Trust me?_ For a long moment, Sarah stared at the odd 'glasses' in her hand; more like goggles with headphones really, and a harness that held it securely to the wearer's head.

Could she trust him? Experience told her she could. Her eyes glossed over Chuck's Tron poster as she put them on, and the display lit up like it was scanning her eyes, saying **IDENTITY AUTHENTICATED.**

A question then appeared before her, hovering in space.

 **DID YOU KNOW YOU WERE ONCE A PROJECT OMAHA CANDIDATE, JUST LIKE CHUCK AND BRYCE?**

 **THAT WAS WHY YOU WERE PARTNERED WITH BRYCE.**

 **IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN CHUCK.**

 **NOW, I** **'** **M GOING TO TRY TO CORRECT THAT MISTAKE, THE DISSERVICE I DID TO MY SON... AND YOU.**

 **IF YOU WANT TO HELP HIM, THIS IS YOUR CHANCE.**

 **TRUST ME, SARAH, THIS WILL BE OVER IN A FLASH.**

 _A flash?_ Sarah's world then went topsy-turvy, that fast.

Chuck's TRON poster suddenly had new meaning.

-xXx-

A myriad of images began flashing in front of her eyes, capturing them, locking them. She couldn't look away if she tried. Memories. Another life. And it wasn't hers! But it was! They flooded her mind like a wave crashing over a breakwater, and she fell back onto Chuck's bed. Then everything around her disappeared in a vortex filled with blue light and stars. Like it _looked_ in TRON (she and Chuck had watched that one soon after they met), it _felt_ like she was being disassembled and reassembled again.

The room that materialized around her was _NOT_ Chuck's.

 _What the_ _ **actual**_ _fuck?!_

Sarah jumped up from the bed and stared down at a... a uniform? It was black, with bronze piping-like stripes and friction-reducing panels, not her normal white and black uniform with the shiny, white material covered in hexagonal shapes.

 _Huh?!_

This _new_ uniform signaled... _a change?_ A change in the way she measured her loyalty that showed, and, _damn_ , it was incredibly form-fitting. And it _felt_ so light. The moderately cut tunic bodice showed off her ample... assets; more ample than normal for her. Speaking of assets: she caught her reflection in a window as her gaze whirled around the unfamiliar room, and looked closer over her shoulder at her... _Oh... my... God..._

It wasn't a huge difference, but it showed.

With a jerk, she shook her head. The room she was in was something from the future... _the far future._

 _That_ _'_ _s ME,_ her mind shouted shrilly at her when her eyes refocused on her face in the window... _sort of._ _And I_ _'_ _m a brunette? Her? That woman I saw? And are those stars outside?_

 _They_ _'_ _re moving!_

Stepping briskly to a desk not far from the bed, she stared at the strangest of computer monitors—one she inexplicably knew how to use—and she blinked hard. Everything looked... so _real_... and yet... not. Sarah shook her head again, trying to wake up... trying to make some sense of what had just happened to her. Her stunned eyes traveled down to the pair of black boots that she was wearing, boots that came over her knees. She was so tempted to try to click the high-heels of them together, to see if doing so would get her out of this bizarre representation of Oz.

 _Something_ , however, kept her from doing it; and she slumped into the surprisingly comfortable chair and let out a shaky breath. Not something, _someone_.

 _CHUCK!_

Her eyes then shot up, when the door her desk was facing, opened with a soft hiss. And they grew large when a tall man with short cropped brown hair and hazel eyes walked in. Those eyes looked unreal when they locked on hers. _Everything_ had a sharp-edged tinge of surreal. But, somehow, those eyes were also still Chuck's, just as expressive.

"Do you have a minute, Miranda?" he asked when he stopped in front of her desk.

 _Maybe if you quit asking me that question the same exact way every blankety-blank time_ , she thought inexplicably, and with startling annoyance.

 _...WAIT a minute!... Miranda?_ Where had she heard that name? From Morgan? Then Sarah did a double-take.

" _Chuck?_ _"_ She couldn't believe what she was seeing. There was no mistaking it was Chuck. Even the voice of the hyperreal avatar before her sounded remarkably like him. _It IS him!_ Damn, it was all so real... _he_ was so very real... but it wasn't... couldn't... his _hair_...

 _Those are definitely his curls._ A voice inside her head was screaming that she was... _off script?_ But the shock of seeing him like this, and in some kind uniform too—that fit his lean, muscular form extremely well—the combined effect overrode all of her cognitive functions and senses. The look in his eyes turned a bit curious and his brows lifted, until she replied: "Of course, Commander; what can I do for you?"... _Commander? He_ _'_ _s a leader? Where are these memories coming from?!_

And now she was only more startled. Her voice had slipped into one that sounded... _Australian?_ But there was no mistaking it was hers. What kind of strange truth was _this?_

Commander Chuck Shepard blinked hard under his raised brows.

He was still trying to get used to how conversations had morphed into something totally natural, now that he was actually in it. (!...!...!) Everything was so... _personal?_ _Very_ first-person. Getting shot felt like... getting _shot._ It hurt like hell. Yeah, he'd already resigned himself to the fact that Commander Shepard was who he currently was, until this game was over or his dad said otherwise. _B_ _ut, other than bringing stark reality to the battle, to what end and what purpose?_

After a couple of 'weeks' in this 'verse, he was still railing about that, but, within his blended thoughts—he was still trying to make sense of—his head was currently spinning as fast as the vortex that'd pulled him here... from _one_ word. ' _Chuck_ _'_ _? I must be hearing things. That sounded like Sarah! That's not... possible? Then again, me being here like this shouldn't be possible either. Dad, so help me, if you modded this game into something it wasn't intended to_ _be—_

"Commander Shepard?"

"Huh?"

"Your minute is almost up."

The Commander's eyes shot wide open, but, to Sarah's surprise, other than a jerk of his head back, his body language remained pretty much unchanged. Then he grinned. _Wow._ There was no mistaking that Chuck Bartowski grin. "As usual, I was wondering about the ship and crew, how they're doing with all this new news," he said, his expression turning a bit more curious, and somber. "But, for a second there, you looked really troubled. Is everything okay with your sister? You haven't heard anything...?"

"No. No, my sister is okay." _My SISTER! Oh, my, Go..._ "No, Commander... it's just that... the ship and crew are doing fine... and I couldn't be happier with how our last mission went... on Tuchanka?" _Tuchanka? And that big green lizard that looks like Godzilla in armor, that we_ _'_ _ve currently got living in one of the cargo bays...? A Krogan who speaks mostly in grunts; who is, in fact, named Grunt!.. ?_

"Good. I'm glad Oriana is safe. I'm also trying not to think too much about how that went down on Tuchanka, honestly," the Commander replied, self-consciously rubbing the back of his neck. "I don't like playing the hard-ass like that, but the only kind of weakness a Krogan understands, is the self-deprecating kind displayed by a magnanimous victor."

"And it worked... again," _Chuck._ "You've shown a keen understanding of the Krogan, Commander." _And you were a hard-ass. I've never seen anything like it... but... I don't want that for you!_

"Thanks. I'm trying to. It's good to have Wrex on my side again... and Grunt finding his angry center is good too... better," Chuck Shepard softly replied, to Sarah's amused surprise. He then shook his head and looked at her with obvious perplexity. "I shouldn't keep you any longer. You have a million duties. I should go... let you get to them."

"On the contrary. You're my duty too, Commander. Chuck, you helped me save my sister. I won't forget that... or the fact that you're what is holding all of this together. Whatever you need, Commander." _Who the HELL just said that?!_

The way that Chuck looked back at her, said that who he'd heard, was _Sarah_. She gulped.

Her breath had caught full in her throat when she felt two memories collide with explosive energy. Miranda Lawson had just told Sarah Walker how much she was holding back, from someone she'd long ago proclaimed she trusted. Her first name was only the tip of the iceberg.

Molly.

Her mom.

So much more.

The question came out-of-the-blue, hitting her in a very epiphany-like way: Could Chuck's amazing and adaptive mind have made a resolution to all of that already possible, if she'd trusted him... told him... accepted his help?

He'd certainly offered it more than once.

Apparently, he'd offered that kind of heartfelt help to the woman she now... was... is... _being?_ And though it was with reservation, Miranda had asked for his help. Sarah's head spun again. She'd accepted his help and they'd fought hard, supported and defended each other; and now her sister (Oriana?) was safe.

And while they accomplished that mission, Chuck had helped to keep Miranda's sense of humanity intact when it counted the most. And she kept the Commander safe. And it was exhilarating (times two!), because it had nothing (and _everything!)_ to do with duty.

A tinge of jealously coursed through her that she quickly squelched.

Commander Shepard, Chuck, had already sealed the deal, as far as Miranda Lawson was concerned. In her head, Sarah (Miranda?) heard a cackling, ironic laugh. Like her, all Miranda had to do, was figure out what to do about it.

"Sar— ... Miranda, have you had the time you needed to think?" he asked, snapping her back to the present, just in time to see him wince at his own words. The look alone told her, he thought he shouldn't have asked it.

 _That was Chuck!_

 _"_ _I need time... to think..."_ *Boom* Her spinning head snapped to a reverberating stop. _"_ _Scared, Miss Lawson?"_ she heard Commander Chuck Shepard say in her mind. The question was about emotional attachments. He'd only asked her that a few days prior. It played in her head with video-like clarity. _It doesn_ _'_ _t matter if you're scared. It never did. Would you rather die without knowing?_

"It's okay. I have," she answered reassuringly as the realization struck her. "I know you... so damn well... inside and out." Sarah looked up at him, her expression as guarded and yet as vulnerable as Miranda's. Somehow, deep down, she knew it... knew this person... herself. "But I want to know more... so much more. And for you to know me... _everything_." Sarah/Miranda seemed to deflate. "I know we don't have a lot of time... that we never seem to have a lot of that... for us. I _am_ scared. But, whenever you want to talk, wherever we may happen to be... I'd like to do more of that."

Miranda rose, and strode around her desk to draw a surprised Chuck Shepard into an embrace. She kissed him lightly, and trailed her fingertips across a healing scar on his cheek and then down his arm. She'd done it in a very Sarah-like way. His jaw dropped the expected amount. "I think we should keep things on neutral ground for the time being. Meet me in the starboard observation lounge later, after 2nd mess?"

"I don't seem to have a key to that cabin."

"You do now... to all of them." Cocking her head to the side, Sarah inquisitively raised a brow. "Well?"

"Yeah... okay," Chuck softly croaked again in reply. With a wink, she pushed him back toward the door with a gentle shove from her palm on his chest, and he said, "I should go."

As the door squeaked shut behind him, Chuck was left with the distinct impression that something was different about Miranda Lawson, other than she felt thinner in his arms.

His worry, about what his dad was up to, returned. _She called me Chuck!_

-xXx-

Sarah slumped back in her chair after he left, for a moment staring at the automated door that had closed with a hiss. _Miranda,_ she thought; _I_ _'_ _m Miranda. I'm an operative here, too... wherever here currently is. I work for Cerberus. And we're on a ship? A starship?_ Raising her hands to her head, she rubbed her fingertips in circles on her temples. She had a headache, though it was only slight. _What did Stephen do to me?... to_ _ **us**_ _? Was that really Chuck?_

 _"D_ _amn it! Did Stephen just abduct us?"_ she whispered loudly in astonishment. _And was_ _ **Casey**_ _in on it?!_

Astonishment gave way to incredulity... and division... more of it.

To say that Sarah had felt divided ever since Chuck had downloaded version 2 of the Intersect, was an enormous understatement. Now, she felt even more divided. But, to her deep surprise, those divisions felt strangely connected, almost synchronized.

She felt like she could be this woman, this character, with little or no effort.

Her eyes, falling on the transparent monitor on the desk, Sarah scanned what appeared to be a mission report. There was also an icon on the display indicating she, or rather Miranda, had a personal journal. She opened it with a swipe of her finger. A long and slow blink of her eyes followed as she realized she'd done it without a conscious thought, like she'd done it thousands of times before.

What she read was just as familiar and astonishing, both in this world and the one from which she'd been pulled.

Miranda was carefully guarding her words. She'd spent two years, bringing him back... while trying to stay detached. The words in her journal, however, told a truth that could be read between the lines. Miranda Lawson admired Chuck, or Commander Shepard, as much as she did.

Commander Shepard? A colonist, orphaned by violence, in what was apparently a galaxy where violence still existed in abundance. He was also a reluctant hero here, as well. And he'd experienced combat... had killed.

Commander Shepard was already well beyond the line Sarah Walker never wanted Chuck to cross. But, it wasn't real.

 _"_ _I_ ** _know_** _this isn_ _'_ _t real. It's a game... some kind of simulation. Miranda is fictional."_

But it sure felt real. Miranda felt real... understandable... relatable. And the man who'd walked through that automated door was Chuck, of that, she had no doubt.

 _Who does he see when he looks at me?_ Sarah briefly wondered as she stared at her faint reflection in a dark window to... _space!_

 _...He started to say your name. You know it. And it was about something very important. He sees you, too._ _But does he know it's you?_

Chuck. Commander Shepard. Like her own sudden situation, the two didn't quite fit together in her mind... but they did. It was in-your-face and nuanced at the same time.

She shook her head, trying to make sense of a 'codex' now imprinted in her mind. This world was more desperate than the one from which they'd been yanked. They really were in a shooting war with something dangerous and unknown. People were dying, and disappearing, by the thousands.

In this 'verse, it was like Chuck had chosen to be an operative who was an amalgam of both her and Casey. Did he _choose_ this role? Did he have a choice? To be a soldier?

Though he was clearly also a soldier, Commander Shepard was behaving a lot like Chuck. He looked like a man who was trying to do what was right, even when the circumstances were at their worst. And he didn't look that comfortable doing the violent things he was being forced to do... most of the time.

And though the Chuck in 'her world' had hardened too, this battle-hardened version of a 22nd century renaissance man, was still her Chuck... still cared about her and the crew more than himself. It was the first thing he'd asked.

They were at war with something nebulous and unknown - not a whole lot different than what they were facing... _at home?_

 _This isn_ _'_ _t real_ , she reminded herself.

Despite that, Chuck Shepard was also building a team... a team for a suicide mission, supposedly. And though it kept being described as a mission from which none of them would return, it still had to be a success. The survival of the known galaxy depended upon it.

So, naturally, Chuck was selecting the best of the best. Many of them weren't by _his_ choice, but he still called every one of them a friend. Most everyone else he'd recruited so far, felt the same way (as far as Miranda could tell). Some of them were more than that... or wanted more. Sarah... or Miranda, was struck immediately by the way the team tended to gravitate toward the commander, just like Chuck. Even her. Even now, she could feel the tug of his effusive and startlingly charismatic character, times two.

Sarah was also struck by her own role in this ''verse', as Chuck was prone to describing game worlds—something about a one-season-wonder sci-fi show. She wasn't exactly Chuck's handler here; she was Commander Shepard's second in command. But she also took orders from a man with cybernetic eyes; a man who made Langston Graham look like a piker when it came to hidden agendas.

Watching Chuck, or rather Commander Shepard the Infiltrator using tech, was also shockingly familiar; especially a glowing tool on his arm that could have very well been a more slick representation of his father's wrist computer.

 _Stephen._

Then there were the other incredible parallels between this existence and the one from which she'd been torn... _by Stephen._

In this universe, Chuck was what was called a 'biotic'.

The remarkable 'gift' of 'biotic augmentation' was something she had given him (when she'd brought him back from the dead!), using the seemingly unlimited resources of Project Lazarus. Like the Intersect, biotics were both a blessing and a curse. But in this 'verse, she was a biotic too.

Somehow, Stephen Bartowski had pulled them both into this... this game. But being in it did _not_ feel like a game.

 _And the way I got here..._

Did that mean that she was now an Intersect, too? Stephen had 'said' that she always was; or was at least a candidate.

A message scrolled across her screen...

 **I KNOW HOW THIS LOOKS, BUT, TRUST ME, IN THE GRAND SCHEME IT REALLY MEANS NOTHING. IT** **'** **S ONLY A GAME.**

 **IF YOU WANT OUT, I COMPLETELY UNDERSTAND. ALL YOU HAVE TO DO IS SAY IT: COMPUTER; END PROGRAM.**

 **HOWEVER, I REALLY DO THINK YOU SHOULD STAY. I HAVEN'T GIVEN CHUCK THIS CHOICE, AND HE'S IN FOR THE DURATION. UNLESS HE ASKS. FUNNY THING, HE HASN'T DONE THAT YET.** **HE ALSO DOESN'T KNOW I BROUGHT YOU HERE... YET.**

 **HE COULD CERTAINLY USE YOUR HELP HERE, TOO. MAYBE THIS WILL GIVE THE BOTH OF YOU SOME TIME TO TALK... MAYBE THINK ABOUT SOME OF THESE HEAVIER ISSUES YOU'RE FACING FROM A FRESH PERSPECTIVE?**

 **SPEAKING OF PERSPECTIVE: SORRY ABOUT THE CHANGE IN...**

There was a delay before his next words appeared.

 **PHYSICAL PROPORTIONS?**

Sarah tried to stop it, but it came out as an undecipherable snort. Yeah, as far as perfect bodies went, Miranda's was a bit over-the-top. _...help here, too?_ Was there a message in those three words?

 **IT'S GOOD TO HEAR YOU LAUGHING.**

 **SARAH, THE MISSION IS IMPORTANT. BUT IT WILL NEVER BE TOO IMPORTANT FOR FEELINGS TO BE INVOLVED. COMMANDER SHEPARD NEEDS MIRANDA...**

 **IS IT ONLY A GAME?**

 _Holy shit! Is he reading my mind?_

Sarah stared down at her 'ideal' body; the product of her father's genetic engineering. Apparently she had 'daddy issues' here, too... even bigger.

Then she held up her gloved hands. They felt strange, like a second skin; and they were indeed an undergarment for an armored environment suit she often wore - that Commander Chuck Shepard _insisted_ she wear on missions.

A gentle tug on the top of the bodice of her suit revealed that it could be pulled up into a more modest configuration, joining with what was actually a sub-aural throat microphone built into the garment. The rubbery material by itself would stop most low-energy projectile weapons. The sudden duality as she did it felt as strange as her garments.

 _He's trying to keep me safe. He just doesn_ _'_ _t stop caring, wherever he is..._ She couldn't help the smile that slowly grew across her face. _...even if it's a game. You wanted to talk to him, to make things right..._

She shook her head. "Thank you for telling me I'm not stuck here, Stephen, but I think I'll stay awhile."

 **I WAS HOPING YOU WOULD SAY THAT.**

 **WELCOME TO THE YEAR 2185. IT'S GRIM; AND YOU'RE NEEDED.**

As Orion's words faded, Sarah Walker then swiped her fingertips cross the screen, and started studying more about this new universe she found herself in... this new mission.

* * *

Oh God, what the hell am I doing? How is Sarah Walker going to react when she meets Kasumi Goto? Or Tali? Or Garrus for that matter? Or... or... goes on a DLC mission with Liara?

For those who are more than casually familiar with the game, with a few notable exceptions, Lord Trinen's suggested mission order will be the ME 2 timeline in this story with all the DLC's. In this universe, Miranda's loyalty mission was the first one Chuck undertook after the events on Horizon. Chuck also plays it smart, and takes on Zaeed's mission early in order to be able to use the paragon persuasion needed to keep Massani's loyalty.

Right now, I'm thinking this story would be best told between the missions, concentrating on world building and the social interaction on Normandy and elsewhere as the POV bounces back and forth.


End file.
